By the way, if anyone is interested in Australian cinema of this period I would highly recommend the recent trailer compilation DVD Ozploitation Trailer Explosion put out by Intervision. It covers most of the big names such as Patrick, early Bruce Beresford (the Barry McKenzie movies and Don's Party. Also Money Movers, which is another in the crime subgenre of armored car heist films! Though unfortunately Puberty Blues and The Fringe Dwellers aren't featured), Long Weekend, Last Wave, and a number of films by Tim Burstall (Attack Force Z (Vietnam war drama with Sam Neill and Mel Gibson), Stork, Alvin Purple, End Play, Petersen and Kangaroo), but also throws up a host of other titles. It also does the job that any good trailer compilation should do and creates the sense of a particular period and community, especially when actors familiar in some films turn up again and again in other trailers, seemingly in typecast roles!

It is also great for re-establishing Donald Pleasance as having a number of interesting Australian credits! Although one of his most interesting films he was in, Ground Zero does not feature on this disc. (In fact one of the key actors in Australian film of this period, Colin Friels, doesn't turn up on that trailer compilation much at all, but is an actor worth investigating, particularly his diverse roles in Ground Zero, Malcolm, Grevious Bodily Harm and Warm Nights On A Slow Moving Train)

A lot of the more artier Australian entries, outside of the borderline Peter Weir films, are not represented here either, so there is still a lot of room for exploration. I'm particularly thinking of the director Paul Cox who made the great film The Golden Braid.

Jack Clayton's rare and eerie Our Mother's House is airing this Wednesday, November 12 at 6:00 pm Eastern time. This film has popped up in a few discussions here before, including the Films for Children thread, where it came up as one of Martin Scorsese's favorites. I give the movie a solid recommendation. It's by turns creepy, touching, and suspenseful, with some great performances by its cast of child actors, including the always wonderful Pamela Franklin.

Joined: Wed Apr 28, 2010 12:04 pmLocation: A Midland town spread and darkened into a city

Lo and behold, TCM-HD finally switched over to true HD this week! For the last five years or so, all programming was just up-coverted standard definition. Not sure how many HD masters they have on hand, but it's nice to see the channel join the 21st century.

If you subscribe to DISH Network, I'd highly recommend that you call and complain about them having dropped TCM. They'll likely offer you a credit to your account, but more importantly, it lets them know that this is programming that people value. (They're probably mostly just hearing about people missing Cartoon Network and CNN.)

This has already been mentioned in the Criterion/Warner thread, but it's worth repeating. Tom Schiller's Nothing Lasts Forever airs tonight at 2 AM EST. Never released on theatrically or on video, and I believe this marks the first time it has ever aired on U.S. television.

On the heels of Nothing Lasts Forever, TCM will air another buried early-'80s film from the Warner vault at 2:15 AM on 1/31: Twice Upon a Time. This apparently hasn't been seen on TV since 1998 and the only home video release was on VHS (though it was very briefly on Amazon Instant when it was still called "Amazon Unbox").

Does TCM ever run any tv miniseries? I have been searching far and wide for a dvd copy of the 1986 Peter The Great, starring the awesome Max Schell and can't find anything online except for an unavailable copy from Europe.